Height of Paranoia
by Eve Davidson
Summary: Craig's dad doesn't die at the end of season two, instead he tries to make amends with Craig.
1. Chapter 1

I'd told Joey last night that I hated him, my father. It was true. But it was the first time I'd said it to anyone. Saying things makes them more real. It couldn't be taken back. And I did hate him. Being away from him all this time, suffering through the awkward phone calls, thinking about moving back in with him because I'd have to sometime. And it's just the same, nothing has changed. We still related to each other the same way.

And being away from him for all this time has made it clearer to me that he was wrong. When I lived with him I didn't have such a clear grasp of that. I'd thought it was my fault, that I made him angry. I was right about that part, I did. But he was wrong to be so mean, to be so abusive. And now I thought it might all be a little more complicated than I thought. His job, my mother leaving him, his own past, it all figured into how he treated me. It wasn't just me.

When I had gone to his house to get my stuff when I moved out I'd told him there were three options. The first was that I'd go to Children's Aid. The second was that I'd go and stay with Joey until we sorted it out. The third was that I'd stay with him and continue to get beaten. Well, I didn't know if we'd ever be able to sort it out.

I analyzed it all. He wanted me to move back in with him, to go to Europe for the summer and then just move back in like nothing had happened at all. And he wasn't right about it being time because he still got so angry and he still hit me because things weren't going his way. And I didn't think I could go back and try to follow all the rules and change my behavior based on his moods.

I went downstairs and Joey was making a grocery list, Ang was playing in the living room. I felt self conscious because of the stupid cut under my eye. But I'd play it off, I'd laugh it off like it didn't bother me. My old coping mechanism.

I saw the concern in Joey's eyes, the pity. Man, did I hate that look. He went to touch my face and I jerked away. There was a knock at the door and I was convinced it was my dad. I could feel the fear going though my bloodstream. That made me hate him more. I hated what he had done to me, how he always treated me, how I was so fucked up because of it.

"Do you think it's my dad?" I said to Joey, and he looked at me like I was just a little crazy.

"Your dad? No," Joey said, and that was reassuring, but he didn't know my dad. When he wanted something, like wanting me to come back and live with him again, he could be tenacious. Joey went to answer the door and I stayed where I was, trying to breathe normally, trying to get my heart to stop racing.

"Albert," I heard Joey say, and I heard the surprise in his voice. I saw Angie look up from her Barbies. I thought of running. I didn't want to talk to him, the bastard.

"Joey. Is Craig here?" he said, and his voice was calm and sorry. But I wouldn't forgive him. Not this time.

"Yeah, he is. But I'm not sure he wants to talk to you right now," Joey said, and I felt this wave of love for Joey. Joey, unlike my dad, had my best interests at heart. And he was so different from my dad it was almost unbelievable. It was unbelievable to me that my mom could have married two such different men.

"I understand," he said, and I could only see Joey. The door blocked my view of my dad, "I'd like to apologize,"

"Wait a second," Joey said, and left him standing there. He came over to me, talking quietly.

"Craig, you don't have to talk to him if you don't want to. I'll tell him to leave," Joey said, and I was looking down. I hated him. I had admitted it. But I still felt the urge to please him, to have things be right with him. I couldn't refuse him. I wasn't strong enough.


	2. Chapter 2

I stood in the living room, looking down. I'd told Joey it was okay, he could come in. I licked my lips. Joey and Ang were in the kitchen, and I knew Joey was keeping his eye on us.

"Craig," he said, and I wouldn't look at him. I could see his hands, though. I saw the ring that had cut my face. I saw the hands that had grabbed me so many times I'd lost count. The hands that had balled into fists and punched me. What could he say to make me forgive him?

"Listen, I'm sorry," he said, and I just kept looking down. This sucked. I didn't forgive him. I didn't want to ever see him again. It made me mad that he came to Joey's house like this. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Joey looking over with his critical look. I saw Ang with her mouth opened like a little o.

"Yeah," I said, not committing to anything.

If we were alone that response, and the tone of my voice could make him angry, could make him grab me and shake me and demand things from me. It was always like that with him. Things had to be his way. I was sick of it. I'd been sick of it for a long time. I hadn't been staying with Joey all that long. A school year, that was it. I was just getting over feeling like I had to second guess everything I did. I was just starting to feel like a regular kid and now he wanted to take it all away from me. I looked at Joey with this pleading, wide-eyed look. 'Help,' my look said. Then I looked down at my dad's shiny dress shoes.

Joey walked over to us, Angie kind of stared at him.

"Um, okay. Albert, I think you should go now," Joey said, and I took a deep breath, closed my eyes. My dad might argue with him, might yell, might demand that he had a right to see me. I felt sick.

My dad looked at me and I kept my expression blank. Go, just go, I thought. I couldn't take it. I couldn't take his anger and his yelling and his sarcastic questions. Just go.

"Okay," he said, resigned. I heard the sadness in his voice. But I didn't care. I just didn't care. It was all his fault. He left, and I felt the tightness in my chest loosen. I could hardly breathe when my dad was around. I sat on the stool in the kitchen and looked at the linoleum floor.

"Sorry, Craig. You were right. It was your dad," Joey said, and I nodded and laughed a little shaky laugh.

"Yeah, well, just because you're paranoid it doesn't mean they're not after you," I said, quoting the Nirvana song I'd just been listening to. I liked that line.

I couldn't see going back to live with my dad. What had changed? Nothing. I liked it here. I could breathe here.

0000000000000000000000000000000000

"What happened?" Ashley said at school Monday morning, reaching out to touch the cut under my eye. I let her, tensing up as I felt her fingertip brush my skin.

"Nothing," I said, and realized that nothing didn't explain the cut and the black eye. She looked at me with a critical puzzlement and I hung my head.

"Okay. I got in a fight,"

"With who?" she said, and it was just like the discussion about it with Joey.

"My dad," I said, confessing, sicking it up like poison. My dad.

"He hit you?" she said, and I saw Sean near us, listening in.

"Yeah,"

"I told you not to go with him," Sean said, his eyes narrowed at me.

"I thought things might have been different," I tried to defend it to Sean. He shook his head.

"It's never different, man. Never,"

"That's why you live with Joey?" Ashley said, looking all concerned and sad, "because your dad hits you?"

"Yeah, he did. But he won't anymore," I said.


End file.
